WHAT HAPPENED IN 1878.
Look what happened the 1878.

Sofia is emancipated from Ottoman rule. (4. January 1878)

Umberto I becomes King of Italy. (9. January 1878)

Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878) – Battle of Philippopolis: Captain Aleksandr Burago with a squadron of Russian Imperial army dragoons liberates Plovdiv from Ottoman rule. (16. January 1878)

The revolutionary Vera Zasulich shoots at Fyodor Trepov, the Governor of Saint Petersburg. (24. January 1878)

Yale Daily News becomes the first daily college newspaper in the United States. (28. January 1878)

John Tunstall is murdered by outlaw Jesse Evans, sparking the Lincoln County War in Lincoln County, New Mexico. (18. February 1878)

Thomas Edison patents the phonograph. (19. February 1878)

The first telephone book is issued in New Haven, Connecticut. (21. February 1878)

The Russo-Turkish War ends as Bulgaria regains its independence from Ottoman Empire according to the Treaty of San Stefano; shortly after Congress of Berlin stripped its status to an autonomous state of the Ottoman Empire. (3. March 1878)

The British frigate HMS Eurydice sinks, killing more than 300. (24. March 1878)

Gilbert and Sullivan's comic opera H.M.S. Pinafore opens at the Opera Comique in London. (25. May 1878)

Cyprus Convention: The Ottoman Empire cedes Cyprus to the United Kingdom but retains nominal title. (4. June 1878)

League of Prizren is established, to oppose the decisions of the Congress of Berlin and the Treaty of San Stephano, as a consequence of which the Albanian lands in Balkans were being partitioned and given to the neighbor states of Serbia, Montenegro, Bulgaria and Greece. (10. June 1878)

Eadweard Muybridge takes a series of photographs to prove that all four feet of a horse leave the ground when it runs; the study becomes the basis of motion pictures. (15. June 1878)

Canada joins the Universal Postal Union. (1. July 1878)

Thoroughbred horses Ten Broeck and Mollie McCarty run a match race, recalled in the song Molly and Tenbrooks. (4. July 1878)

The coat of arms of the Baku Governorate is established. (5. July 1878)

Treaty of Berlin: the European powers redraw the map of the Balkans. Serbia, Montenegro and Romania become completely independent of the Ottoman Empire. (13. July 1878)

Emma Nutt becomes the world's first female telephone operator when she is recruited by Alexander Graham Bell to the Boston Telephone Dispatch Company. (1. September 1878)

Over 640 die when the crowded pleasure boat Princess Alice collides with the Bywell Castle in the River Thames. (3. September 1878)